Dec 07, 2017 23:26 ISTThe first seaplane demo flight will take off from the city airport and land in the water at Girgaum chowpatty on Saturday in the presence of chief minister Devendra Fadnavis, minister of road transport & highways, shipping and water resources Nitin Gadkari and ministry of civil aviation minister Gajapathi Raju.

Following this, Fadnavis is expected to address the audience.

Ten to 14-seater amphibious planes, which can land on water and land, will be operational soon. In October, SpiceJet had announced its decision to buy more than 100 aircraft for $400 million. It signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with Setouchi Holdings Inc, a Japan-based small aircraft company. SpiceJet conducted demo runs in Nagpur and Guwahati in the first week of October. An airline official said this will, however, be the first trial on water. The airline said it plans to boost regional connectivity through the introduction of these seaplanes, which will connect regions that have poor-quality airfields. The cost of each aircraft is around Rs4crore.

“The introduction of smaller fixed-wing aircraft will connect places that lacked infracture earlier. Amphibious planes have the potential to boost tourism. They can not only be used for leisure travel, but also for emergency evacuations and to reach remote areas,” said an airline official.

Ajay Singh, chairman and managing director of SpiceJet said the airline has been a huge supporter of the government’s regional connectivity scheme from the beginning.

“Seaplanes can be used during medical emergencies. However, they can only fly short routes,” said president of Air Passengers Association of India, Sudhakar Reddy.

Will be interesting to see if it works. The three current seaplane companies operating in New York City seem to do OK in season due to the vast amount of high income people that live there and can afford a $1,200 per person round trip ticked every weekend of the summer season. Maybe the European tourist trade will support this set up, if it works, gets the equipment and keeps them flying safely. I will be happy this coming season if I can finally get on the water in the Sedan and meet up with the Island Bob boys (including Glenn) come Spring. I am too old to worry about the rest of the world and we have our hands full in this country at the moment.

Bob

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BobWest Nyack Aviation, L.L.C. New York, New York - East Hampton, New York & Warwick, New York 631.374.9652rkittine@aol.com WA2YDV

Finding pilots and mechanics that will put up with a subsidized airline will be the biggest challenge. These type of government involved companies use the 'manager for everything' model. It won't be long and the airline will be all managers and no workers.